


FFXIVWrite 2020

by antiheroic



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Multi, Tumblr: FFXIVwrite2020, this might get spicy who knows, will add tags as the challenge goes on!!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:06:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 7,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26260867
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antiheroic/pseuds/antiheroic
Summary: as organized by @MoenMoenFFxiv on Twitter!! check out theircarrdfor more info!will contain spoilers through patch 5.3 and focus heavily on 5.0+ content. (i have emet brainworms.)my WoL is Guinevere Havoc, DRK, fem Highlander, though i'm going to write about my friends' WoLs as well!!Tables of Contents:Day 1: Crux // Hadezem/EmetWoL (Guinevere Havoc), TDay 2: Sway // Haurchefant/WoL (Guinevere Havoc), MDay 3: Muster // Y'shtola/WoL (Guinevere Havoc), TDay 4: Clinch // {Atlas} shenanigans, TDay 5: Matter of Fact // Alphinaud & Alisaie Leveilleur & WoL (Guinevere Havoc), TDay 6: You pick: Revelry // {Atlas} shenanigans, TDay 7: Nonagenarian // Thancred/WoL (Lei Mallory), TDay 8: Clamor // Thancred & WoL (Guinevere Havoc), TDay 9: Lush // EmetWoL (Guinevere Havoc), TDay 10: Avail // Emet-Selch & non-WoL Scion!PC (Guinevere Havoc, Khava Dari as the WoL), TDay 11: coming soon!!
Relationships: Haurchefant Greystone/Warrior of Light, Solus zos Galvus | Emet-Selch/Warrior of Light, Warrior of Light/Thancred Waters, Y'shtola Rhul/Warrior of Light
Kudos: 19
Collections: Final Fantasy Write Prompt Challenge 2020





	1. Crux

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> hades reflects on the reflections.

Hades has overseen the rise and fall of countless civilizations. With exquisite grace he has orchestrated the folding of one shard after another, crumpling them down against the Source as if the worlds and the lives which inhabit them were so much as the crinkles of an accordion. It is not destruction to slot together the scattered pieces of a broken puzzle, but blessed creation, and the Architect has ever had a talent for shaping something from less than nothing. 

In the end it is a spark of blue that seals his fate. 

She's nothing like his Traveler, this Warrior of Light. 

( _Darkness_ , she corrects absentmindedly, as though he doesn't know intimately how deep the Dark within her goes.) 

She is bold and stern and sardonic—friendly, to a degree, even sweet towards some, but all her edges are whetted by the incessant grinding of a world that has decided she is their savior. This hero _(I have a **name** , Emet-Selch,)_ lives at the intersection of fear and fury and carries within her a bone-deep hatred that would have looked foreign on Azem's face. 

And yet she bears their kindness, their passion, their keen attunement to the hurts of the world. Not their laugh, but the quirk of their eyebrow, the roll of their wrist, the crack of their neck. Not their smile, but its afterimage. 

Their brightest blue. 

For thousands of years Hades has worked to piece his people back together with perfect, acute precision; rejoining by rejoining he has stacked the bricks of his future past. 

Azem, his Traveler, his Erebus—they are gone to all but his memory. 

_(I might be fractured, Emet-Selch, but I am nothing less than myself.)_

It is not until the Warrior of Darkness, sick with Light, storms the gates of the Amaurot he created for her that he remembers the first thing he learned as Architect: a creation is nothing without its cornerstone. The Convocation has ever been lost without its wayward heart. 

He speaks his memories into fourteen crystals and leaves them for her, scattered through the walkways of his grief. He cannot undo what has been done, but he can lay a new foundation. 

Hades cannot walk with her, this hero, his Havoc; but he can ensure that a star remains for her to shepherd into the future she carves with gritted teeth and iron will. 


	2. Sway

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the aftermath of gwen and haurchefant getting stumbling drunk at a party.

_“Shh, shh shh.”_ Gwen giggles as she puts a finger to Haurchefant’s lips, leaning heavily on his shoulder as they stumble together down the long darkened hallways of Fortemps Manor. _“Quiet, I don’t want to wake anyone up.”_

Haurchefant looks at her with solemn wide eyes and nods against her finger—before parting his lips and taking it into his mouth, which for a heartbeat sends all the blood in Gwen’s body rushing to her belly. She stops, and she sways in place as she considers how feasible it would be for her to get him out of his layers on layers of fancy noble robes right there in the corridor. Her other hand is inching towards his waist when Haurchefant purses his lips around her finger, 

_(suck on it, sweetheart, you’re so good for me, you take me so well,)_

and blows a raspberry. 

Gwen snorts loud enough that it echoes down the hall—immediately she claps a hand over her mouth, fighting to smother her laughter and making a break for her quarters. Haurchefant solidly plods along behind her, looking on with a serene, half-lidded triumph that belongs only to those who have declined to know the meaning of shame. 


	3. Muster

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which guinevere havoc has a fit of jealousy.

_You're a coward, Havoc._

After three years of intimate acquaintance Gwen is accustomed to telling her darkside to shut the fuck up, though she's only recently trained herself to do so _silently._ People tended to take her seriously, as she was a stern-faced woman with a strong jawline and a massive sword, but there was something about constantly mumbling to oneself that tended to undermine a person's authority.

Runar doesn't care about Gwen's authority in the slightest, apparently, because he's putting his oversized mitts on her mage. He doesn't even have the decency to notice when she straightens her shoulders and glowers at him.

_She's not **yours** , though, is she? 'cause you're chickenshit._

Y'shtola clocks her souring mood even as Runar cradles her in his arms like she's his bride and the Greatwood their threshold, and shoots her a warning look. Gwen has been on the receiving end of that look far too many times to be comfortable disregarding it, and regardless she doesn't really want to hurt Runar. The fantasies flicking fast and bloody through her mind's eye aren't kind, exactly, but none of them would cause much in the way of permanent damage.

But Gwen keeps her peace as Y'shtola kindly requests freedom from Runar's fierce, tearful embrace, and makes her rounds of farewells to the rest of the Night's Blessed. She intends to maintain her silent vigil until Y'shtola is ready to go back to the Crystarium, but to her dismay, Runar sidles up beside her.

"Excuse me, Miss Warrior of Darkness," he says, arms folded across his chest as though he’s attempting to be stern. Twelve help her, she’s not a small woman, but he’s taller than her even slouched and his biceps are as thick as her own muscular thighs. Not that she’s envious, or wondering if Radovan would be willing to give her some workout tips when they get back to the Source.

“Havoc,” Gwen corrects flatly.

“Ah—” This seems to fluster him, and Gwen almost feels bad for him. It can’t be easy, approaching the Warrior of Darkness when she’s in your village, clad in black plate and bearing a sword as big as you are. Then she remembers that he _picked up Y’shtola_ , and her pity dies screaming.

“Sorry, Miss Havoc,” Runar continues, once he recovers. He bounces a little on his toes, and Gwen can see the grind of his jaw working itself in circles. “I just wanted to say thank you for everything you’ve done, but especially. Well, I’m—we’re—going to miss Master Matoya, but it’s because of you that she gets to go home at all. So thank you. For taking care of her.”

Gwen doesn’t know what to say to that. She stands there silent for long enough that Runar starts to fidget, glancing about nervously for someone who might be able to back him up, so she offers what she hopes is a stoic nod befitting of a hero who has done their duty. It seems to work, because Runar grins wide and thumps his arm against his chest in a salute, then trots back to join Y’shtola and the rest of the Blessed.

Gwen watches, and she waits.

Eventually Y’shtola finishes her goodbyes and joins Gwen’s side.

“I think it’s time I take my leave,” she says. She’s smiling, restrained and bittersweet, and it makes Gwen’s chest ache. But she nods, and takes hold of Y’shtola’s elbow as she focuses her aether on the Crystarium’s aetheryte.

Y’shtola shakes her head and pulls away. Gwen, puzzled, lets the cast fizzle out.

“I’d like to go the long way, if time allows,” she says.

“You’re the one who decides that,” Gwen points out. “It’s your mortal existence at stake, not mine.”

"Then time allows,” Y’shtola says decidedly, and strides with purpose into the Greatwood.

 _Ah, fuck._ Gwen takes off after her, jogging for a handful of steps to catch up, her armor clanking all the while. “On second thought, maybe you shouldn’t be allowed to decide,” she amends, her brow creasing. “Since you famously don’t care at all for your mortal existence.”

“That is an exaggeration, Guinevere. The risks I take are calculated.”

“Then you’re not very good at math,” Gwen mutters, sotto voce. Y’shtola smiles, serene.

They walk in companionable silence for some time. Periodically Y’shtola will pause, her ears flicking as she listens for some distant birdcall or groan of living wood, taking in the sounds and smells of the home she has never seen for the last time. The Greatwood has always been beautiful, but Gwen ignores the scenery for the sorceress, fixing the image of the Miq’ote amongst the sun-dappled boughs firmly in her mind.

_Just say something, coward._

They’re crossing the boundary into Lakeland when Gwen says, “We could figure out a way for you to stay, if you wanted.” It comes out more sullen than she intended.

“Hm?”

“If you wanted to stay with the Night’s Blessed, I mean. Making your existence here more stable has to be easier than getting you back to the Source.”

Y’shtola raises her eyebrows. “I hardly think we have the time right now to be thinking about that kind of experimentation, but regardless: I meant what I said. I will find a way back, in time.”

Gwen grunts.

“But I wish to be on the Source,” she continues gently. “I am sorry to leave here, but glad to return. Both can be true at the same time, Guinevere.”

“I just don’t want you to have any regrets.”

“Is this about Runar?” Y’shtola asks, blunt as ever, sounding far more amused than she has any right to be.

Gwen grunts again.

“As charming as he is, I assure you that I have no interest in sacrificing my life on the Source to stay here with him.”

“So you think he’s charming.” Gwen cringes as soon as the words come out—she sounds like a jealous teenager, and not the woman of thirty-five years she claims to be.

“Much more charming than your possessive streak, yes.”

“I’m not being _possessive_ ,” Gwen counters with a huff. “I am expressing concern for my dear friend’s judgement.”

“Says the woman in love with a dead Ascian.”

For a long moment there is only the sound of snickering gremlins creeping in the underbrush as Gwen’s stomach drops, and she struggles to bite back her sudden flash of anger.

Y’shtola sighs. “That was too far,” she says quietly.

“It’s fine,” Gwen manages.

“It is not. I… am sorry. I know his loss has been difficult for you.”

“And I know leaving here is difficult for _you_.” Gwen rubs at her forehead, willing her racing heartbeat to calm itself. “I didn’t mean to pick a fight. I’m sorry.”

“I know.”

Silence falls over them again, though it is tense and strained as they move more quickly now through groves of violet and lilac. Night is beginning to fall, and the Crystal Tower gleams like a beacon against the darkening sky.

They wind up the path where Gwen began her journey on the First and pass the watch towers outside the Crystarium. Lyna and the guards on duty salute, to which Gwen and Y’shtola wave in kind, and they continue up towards the entrance to the Aetheryte plaza.

**_Say something, coward._ **

“Shut _up_ ,” Gwen mutters to herself, and Y’shtola stops.

“I would prefer if you did not, if it’s all the same to you,” she offers dryly. Gwen snorts.

“Sorry, I wasn’t—”

“I know.”

Some small knot of tension in Gwen’s belly begins to unspool. She takes a breath as Y’shtola waits with unwavering patience for her to find her words.

“I’m sorry he’s gone,” Gwen says carefully, slowly, “but I’m glad to be here. With you.”

She’s rewarded with a smile, and even as the last of the sickness in her gut subsides, she finds her heart thrumming like bird’s wings within her chest.

“Simultaneity,” Y’shtola offers, and Gwen nods, relieved. “Shall we go in, then?”

Gwen nods again, but when the sorceress turns to enter the Crystarium it takes a half-dozen steps for her to realize that her companion is not following, and she turns to look at Gwen with a quizzical expression.

“Is everything alright, Guinevere?”

_Let’s **go** , Havoc._

“Yes, sorry,” she says, and jogs with clanking plate to catch up. “I was just thinking, uh.”

Y’shtola looks to her expectantly, and Gwen knows that she can’t actually see her, but her blank white eyes are crinkled at the edges with her smile, and Gwen feels a flash of heat begin to crawl up her neck.

“There’s this tea shop in Kugane. I was thinking, maybe we could go. When you’re situated, I mean.”

“That sounds lovely,” Y’shtola says. “I never did get to see much of Doma, and it would be nice to spend time with everyone again.”

“Ah—” Gwen clears her throat, takes a deep breath. “Just us, I meant.”

“Oh.” Y’shtola blinks. “ _Oh_.”

“If you would be interested, I mean, it’s absolutely okay if you’re not—”

“Guinevere,” Y’shtola says, looking uncomfortably like a cat who’s just caught her prey, “if I were not interested, you would have known a long time ago.”

_There you go._

“Well. Great.” Gwen feels a bit dizzy, and it’s not until her cheeks start to ache that she realizes just how hard she’s smiling. She extends her arm for Y’shtola to take, nudging her lightly so she knows it’s there. “Then let’s get you back to the Source, yeah?”

Y’shtola declines to answer. Instead she loops her arm through Gwen’s and tugs her with firm purpose through the bustle of the Aetheryte plaza and up the stairs to the tower’s entrance. Quickly they wind their way through the maze of its interior until they join the rest of their friends, both pink-cheeked and grinning, and make their preparations to leave one home and return to another.


	4. Clinch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which khava and gwen try out a new combat tactic.

“Khava, I really don’t think this is a good idea.”

Elcera is fussing with her hair, tugging it against the leather strap holding it back from her face as if making sure it’s secure. She has that mother-hen look on her face—ironic, Gwen thinks fondly, given that she’s the youngest of all them—that foretells either loud worrying until shenanigans have ceased, or prompt medical attention once the shenanigans are forced to cease due to inevitable injury.

“It’s _fine_ ,” Khava insists, while at the same time Lei does not look up from the book she’s reading on the bench by the stables and says, “I wanna see where this goes.”

Falke is maintaining a safe distance from the damage zone and Khava both as he works quietly in the garden plot on the other side of the yard, though he glances up periodically to make sure that Gwen hasn’t been blown up.

The padjal sighs and throws her hands up. “Fine, whatever, wreck the house and break your neck, see if I care.”

“Thanks for your vote of confidence,” Gwen says dryly, adjusting her grip on her greatsword, “But this’ll be a clinch. Ready, babes?”

Khava’s ears flatten against her head as she bares her teeth in a wide, grinning snarl. “Let’s do this.”

Gwen widens her stance and sinks into it, holding her sword low to the ground, while Khava erupts into an explosion of light and sound. She dashes forward towards Gwen and leaps, landing squarely on the flat of Gwen’s blade as she makes a heavy upward swing, sending the Miq’ote careening up through the air. She does some kind of acrobatic twisting motion that makes Gwen’s back ache in sympathy and sticks a hard landing on the roof of the house, rapier and focus still in hand and primed.

“ _Fuck_ yes,” Gwen cheers.

Falke squints up towards the roof and says dryly, “You knocked some of the shingles loose.”

“But I didn’t break my neck,” Khava says smugly, stowing her weapons.

Elcera sighs, shaking her head, and leaves the lot of them behind as she heads inside the house. Lei is quick to follow, mumbling something about retrieving wood and shale from the workshop to _fix my fucking roof, land a little harder would you_. Gwen joins Falke in the garden, leaning against the fence as she points out what needs pruning; and all the while Khava settles in on the roof, closing her eyes against the warm light of the midday sun as she settles in for a nap.


	5. Matter of Fact

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which a light-sickened gwen reckons with her own mortality.

The irony of it all is that for all its silence, the Light is far louder than Gwen’s darkside has ever been. One moment she is standing in the massive walkways of the ghost of Amaurot; the next she is wracked with pain and numbed by quiet, an oppressive blanket that mutes the rest like all of Ishgard’s blizzards come to roost at once.

“—en, no, nononono Gwen, _please—_ ” 

Gwen does her best to blink away the starbursts floating at the edge of her vision and focus on the small round face in front of her, screwed up in the way of someone who is desperately fighting back tears. Absentmindedly she lifts a hand to pat a cherubic cheek and nearly topples over; the hand was most of her support, apparently, and now she finds herself on both knees with her face planted on the stone walkway. Two sets of small hands hoist her back up to sitting. 

“‘m fine,” Gwen mumbles, shaking the help away, before she turns her head and promptly vomits up a splatter of iridescent white ichor. She holds herself there, head hanging, the thick liquid dripping from her lips like blood, as she tries to think past the pounding in her head and the fractured white noise buzzing in her ears. 

“You’re not,” says a high, thin voice as someone pushes a waterskin to her lips. “You need to rest, you can’t keep pushing yourself like this—” 

“It’s _fine._ ” Gwen takes the waterskin and drains it in one go, wiping the blood and the white from her lips with the back of her sleeve. She picks her greatsword up from where it clattered to the ground and uses it to push herself to her feet. The twins hover around her like moths at a flame, ready to help her should she collapse again. 

“Gwen, I really think you should—” 

_“Enough.”_

Both of the twins stop in their tracks—they know better than to keep pushing when Gwen puts on what Thancred calls her Head Bitch Voice, the one that brooks no argument and offers no negotiation. Alisaie still looks defiant, but more than that, they both look scared. 

Whether she herself is afraid or not, Gwen isn’t sure. Superfluous information; she doesn’t bother checking. 

“I know you’re worried,” she says, before she spits some of the residual ichor in her mouth off to the side. “And I’m sorry, but—Alphinaud, _look at me._ ” 

Alisaie is looking right at her with a trembling lip and her chin held high, her sweet brave girl, but Alphinaud can’t bear to meet her gaze; his fists are clenched at his sides and she can tell he’s fighting back tears, and she doesn’t blame him. Alphinaud has seen the worst of what she has to offer, and now he watches as she stands on the precipice of a monstrosity that even her deepest abyss couldn’t hope to match. One way or another this journey is going to spell the end of her. 

The only question left to answer is whether it will spell the end of the First as well. 

“This is not what kills me,” she says, and she says it so matter-of-factly that just the saying of it makes it somehow feel like something close to a truth. “I’m not going to die like this. Okay?”

Alisaie nods once in a jerky motion while Alphinaud whispers hoarsely, “Okay.”

Gwen feels steady enough to keep moving without help, so she slings her greatsword across her back and gestures for the twins to go on ahead. 

The buzzing in her ears hasn’t faded, a sparking, crackling noise that is as persistent and annoying as her throbbing headache, and as Gwen stares at the mixture of shimmering ichor and bile splattered across the ground, she finds herself wishing briefly that she had done as Emet-Selch instructed and come here alone. Dignity, he’d promised her. Privacy. 

“This is not what kills me,” she says again, firmly, and she takes off after the twins. 

Onward.


	6. Revelry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the gang tallies up the god-body count.

“ _Wild and pure and forever free!_ ” Gwen bellows, before she knocks back the rest of her sake and plops back down in her chair. Lei is howling with laughter, and the other patrons of the Hostelry are looking over at their table with a wary curiosity. Elcera hides her smile behind the rim of her cup. 

“You’re insane,” Thancred says, shaking his head. “All of you, absolutely mad.” 

“I think that was the most fun I ever had fighting a primal,” Khava says thoughtfully. Gwen nods in vigorous agreement as she pours herself another drink and tops off Falke, who has technically yet to finish his first, because his cup never seems to actually _empty._

“Top five at least,” Lei concurs. 

“That you have enough to require a top five ranking is… really something.” G’raha is, in typical fashion, looking right at Elcera as he says this, leaning towards her as though she’s in possession of her own personal gravitational field. She blushes, but her shoulders straighten slightly with pride as she looks over to Lei. 

“We’ve killed well over a dozen at this point, right?” she asks. 

“Are we counting repeats?” 

“What about the Warring Triad?” 

“Ooh, don’t forget Bahamut.” 

“Do Thordan’s Thots count as a collective or can we count each one?” 

“Gwen, I told you, _Thordan’s Thots_ is _not_ going to catch on.” 

“Just you wait, babes, I know this has legs.”

“Closer to thirty, I think,” Lei concludes, grinning widely, “give or take a handful.” 

“ _Rejoice,_ ” Khava hollers, and the table dissolves into laughter as the rest of the tavern’s patrons pretend they’re not listening in.


	7. Nonagenarian

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which thancred is, as ever, an old man.

It takes a few weeks, but with a bit of physical therapy and Krile’s careful (if not gentle) ministrations, Thancred is able to slip back into his morning workout routine. He’s quiet about it, careful not to wake Lei as he goes through sets of pushups, crunches, pull-ups from the door-frame, and he’s lacing up a pair of soft, flexible leather boots in preparation for a run when Lei finally stirs, stretches, and yawns. Her sharp teeth glint in the morning light and she rubs at her eyes with the back of her hand, wrinkling her nose at the daylight and Thancred both. 

“Morning,” he says lightly. 

Lei grunts and flops back down on the bed. “Wha’ time ‘s it?” she mumbles through another jaw-cracking yawn.

“Just before noon.” Thancred balances himself against the doorframe and holds one ankle up behind his back, carefully stretching out his thigh. “Slept in a bit, unfortunately. I’m picking up bad habits.” 

“ _Good_ habits,” Lei insists, flinging one arm over her face to block out the sunlight. “You need the rest. That body’s been atrophying for months and you know you overwork yourself.” 

Thancred waves a dismissive hand—and flails to catch himself before he falls over as he loses his balance. His gaze immediately darts to Lei and he relaxes for a moment when he sees she’s not looking, but then her quiet snickering floats up from the bedspread and he sighs with an exasperated kind of fondness. He switches to stretch his other leg. 

“It’s fine, love. I feel better than I have in years, actually.” Thancred hops up and down on his one leg as if that proves something. “I’m sleeping better, my knees don’t hurt, my back doesn’t ache, I swear I can see more clearly—” 

“You sound like a grandpa,” Lei says, rolling over so she can look at him properly, her tail swishing behind her. She grins, flashing her teeth. “Old man.”

“I am _not_ —” 

“ _When I was your age,_ ” Lei mocks, “ _I had to get to the primal fight by walking uphill in both directions through rain and snow and aetherial storms, and you don’t see me complaining._ ” 

“I’m in my prime!” Thancred says indignantly, trying and failing to bite back his growing smile. “This is the best I’ve ever felt!” 

“Yeah, ‘cause you body-snatched yourself from five years ago.” 

“I’ll body-snatch _you_ ,” he says, and lunges towards Lei as she rolls away, shrieking with laughter. 

“Mercy,” she cries, getting twisted up in the bedsheets as she tries to wriggle away from his grabby hands. “I’m not as young as I once was, I’m of no use to you!” 

“You’ll find no mercy here,” Thancred hisses, then lets out a triumphant ha! as he lands his hands firmly on Lei’s hips and drags her to him. He lays a truly merciless barrage of feather-light kisses across her face and collarbone and the crown of her head while she tries in vain to defend herself. For a moment it seems that victory is his—but then Lei, ever the tactician, launches a decisive counter-assault by grabbing his cheeks and planting a firm kiss against his lips. His one weakness, in truth, as his lips part and his eyes slip closed and he melts into her embrace. 

“Lie in a bit longer,” Lei says softly against his mouth, and he opens his eyes to see her own crinkled at the corners. She looks content, truly relaxed, for the first time in a very long time. 

Thancred has never been very good at denying her anything. 

“As you wish,” he says, and reaps his reward of a second kiss, then a third, then far too many to count.


	8. Clamor

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which thancred scouts out a new recruit.

Heart pounding in her ears, blood welling thick and metallic in her mouth, a young gladiator takes a knee on the sands. She is exhausted: it’s her third match in a row, her nose is bleeding, her ribs are cracked, and the shield she carries with a white-knuckled grip will be bound for the scrap heap as soon as she makes it out of the arena. Her opponent is a lithe hyur man with white hair, and he stands at the opposite end of the sands as he waits for her to decide whether she’s conceding or getting back up. He looks almost disappointed when the gladiator hawks a thick wad of blood and mucus and staggers to her feet.

“You should have yielded,” the man says, toying with his knives. “This won’t end well for you, you know.” 

She just grins, widens her stance, raises her shield. “Just mind the face, prettyboy. It’s where all the money comes in.” 

The man’s laugh is as delicate as a windchime as he sweeps into an exaggerated bow. “I’d never _think_ of harming a work of art such as—” 

The gladiator lunges, and the match resumes to the roar of the crowd’s approval. 

Three minutes later she’s on her back, winded, and she can feel the beginnings of what’s sure to be a nasty bruise come morning blooming across the right side of her back. For a moment she lays there, eyes closed as she listens to the clamor of the audience high above her in the stands. The hyur rogue watches, and wipes a thin sheen of sweat from his brow. Again he waits for her decision. 

Reclaiming her sword from where it tumbled to the ground, the gladiator sticks it in the sands and hauls herself to her feet. Her opponent raises his eyebrows. 

“You’re going to hurt yourself, trying so hard,” he says. 

She spits again and thumps a fist against her chest, taking up her stance again despite the tremble of exhaustion in her arms and the screaming ache of her thighs. 

“Mama didn’t raise a quitter,” she says, closing the distance between them with steady determination, “and they don’t call me Havoc for nothin’.” 

The screaming cheers around the arena are drowned out by the rushing of blood in her ears as she tries first to meet the rogue’s pace, moving as quickly as her sluggish muscles will allow to block and parry his whip-fast blows. It’s all she can do to maintain her defense, however, with no opportunity to press a counterattack, and this is a war of attrition she’ll lose; so she chooses instead to go in with unbridled brutality, throwing all of her weight behind blows heavy enough to kill a man if it were a fight to the death. But he is quick and she is tired, and though she holds out for two minutes more, the hyur sweeps her leg and she hits the ground hard enough to knock the air clean out of her chest. She lays there wheezing as the rogue hovers nearby, panting and wary, waiting for her to summon a fifth wind and get back up again.

The gladiator yields.

When she finally manages to get up, the rogue is gone. 

Eventually she drags herself off the sands and collects her winnings for the first two matches; she quaffs a potion, cracks her neck, pops her shoulder back into place with a bitten-off grunt. The shield goes to its fate in the scrap heap—she’ll buy a nicer one in the morning, one that hopefully won’t slough halfway out of her hand the first time she blocks a fire spell. Her armor is salvageable, so she drops it off at the blacksmith’s and limps with the remainder of her coin to the Quicksand.

The shock of white hair and the smarmy grin chatting up Momodi are unmistakable, however, and she is turning on her heel to leave and get her drink elsewhere when the lalafell spots her from across the tavern. 

“Havoc, get over here!” 

Havoc gets over there. 

“I didn’t think that was your actual name,” the hyur says, peering at her over the rim of his glass as he leans against the counter. “Made for the spotlight, were you?” 

“It’s the face,” she says, passing a few coins over to Momodi with a resigned grimace. “Should’ve been an actress, really, but I like getting beat to shit too much for the humdrum of the stage.” 

“I understand,” comes the solemn reply. “We sacrifice much and more to fulfill our destinies in this life of ours. Why, just the other evening I had to bid an early farewell to two stunning beauties—” 

Momodi smacks a tankard full of ale down on the counter in front of the gladiator, pointedly splashing a bit on the man, and gives them both a cheery smile. “What Master Waters _means_ to say is that he has a job for you, Havoc.” 

“Does he, now?” She sips at her ale, a smirk tugging at her lips. 

He sighs, wiping in vain at the wet spot now blotchy and spreading across his chest. “I do. Protection detail for cargo transport, Ul’dah to Vesper Bay, a thousand gil for three days. Nothing too strenuous for a woman of your capability.” 

“You’re plenty capable yourself, Master Waters.” 

“Thancred, if you would.” 

“You just beat the snot out of me, and now you want to hire me?” 

Thancred offers up only an affable shrug. “What can I say? I liked what I saw.” 

“I don’t sleep with my employers, if that’s what you’re after,” Havoc says flatly. 

“It’s not,” he replies sweetly. “You’re not my type.” 

Havoc heaves a sigh and looks over to the proprietress, who is watching the negotiations with rapt attention. “Thoughts, Momo?” 

Momodi taps her chin thoughtfully. “Master Waters is a boor and a drunk and gets much too fresh with me—” 

_“— hey—”_

“But he’s good on his word for a job, and there’s more where that came from,” she concludes with a vigorous nod. “You want to make a name for yourself as a merc outside that arena, here’s a good place to start.” 

The gladiator chews on her lip for a moment before she shrugs and says, “Sure, fuck it, why not.” 

“Fantastic,” Thancred says, and drains the last of his drink. “I’ll leave a note with Momo when we’re ready to head out—shouldn’t be more than a few days.” 

“That’s Momodi to _you_ , Master Waters.” 

He pouts. “But she just—” 

Momodi fixes him with a stern glare, while Havoc does a piss-poor job of hiding her smug grin behind her tankard. 

“Fine,” he sighs. “Four days, tops. You’ll get half the pay at the start and half when it’s done. Deal?” 

“Deal.” They shake on it before Havoc drains her tankard, then turns to haul herself back to her room, where she can lick her wounds in peace. 

She’s halfway down the hall when she hears ever-so-faintly behind her: “Shit. I forgot to get her _name._ ” 


	9. Lush

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which gwen talks about her soap preferences.

Emet-Selch is a cuddler, as it turns out. He would sneer at the accusation if it were laid at his feet, Gwen is certain, but that doesn’t make the fact not true.

When she’s finally satiated, thighs quaking and sweat dripping in rivulets down her back, she collapses onto her damp sheets and thinks herself content to spend the remainder of her night alone; but Emet-Selch just snaps his fingers to change the sheets and spreads himself across her bed as though it were his own. And sure enough, when Gwen turns on her side to try to settle in for at least a few hours of sleep before dawn breaks and her effort against the Lightwardens has to resume, Emet-Selch follows as thoughtless and natural as gravity. She almost says something, but before she lets loose the mockery that rises to her lips she remembers just how long it’s been since she’s shared a bed with another person. She lets her teasing die unspoken. 

It’s cute, really. 

It’s also really uncomfortable. 

“Alright,” Gwen sighs, turning over to face him. “This isn’t working. There’s no way in hell you’ve ever been a big spoon.” 

“Excuse me?” His exaggerated eyebrows are drawn in a consternated frown, and he shifts in place to pull back like he needs a better view of her face to make sure he heard her right. 

“C’mon, roll over. We’ll both sleep better.” Gwen prods at his bare hip. It doesn’t do anything; he’s surprisingly dense for a man who looks like he should weigh about as much as a sack of wet cats. He shoots her a look that would strike her dead if there were any actual intent behind it, but: he acquiesces. He’s stiff, clearly not thrilled with what’s happening, but Gwen figures he can just void-portal himself out or snap her out of existence if he’s unhappy, and gets herself settled. He’s just barely taller than she is and his legs are _insane_ , so she assumes position C: presses herself against his back, slides her leg between his thighs, slings an arm over his chest so she can rest a hand on his beating heart. Eventually he sighs, and his tension slips away. 

“I suppose,” he says irritably, and Gwen smiles against the skin of his back, presses her lips to the protruding knob of his spine. It’s all terribly intimate, but she’s much too tired and too sticky to unpack that, so she lets herself enjoy it. The way things have been going these past few years, she figures she’s allowed to enjoy _something._

Even if that something is an Ascian in her bed. 

Everyone has vices, she supposes. 

Her train of thought is derailed when she hears Emet-Selch _sniffing_ and she thinks for one terrible moment that she somehow made the big bad Ascian cry—but no, he’s just smelling her, which might be worse. 

“If you tell me again that I need a bath, I’m kicking you out,” she warns. She’s expecting some snarky non-sequitur in return, the ebb and flow of their typical rapidfire banter, but he just covers the hand against his chest with his own and breathes in deep. 

“You used a different soap.” 

Gwen blinks, trying to will away the haze of late-night, well-fucked sleepiness. “What?” 

“Merely an observation,” he says, flatly enough that it could be true if not for the way he holds her hand.

“Uh, yeah.” Gwen shifts up so that she can perch her chin on his shoulder, look with morbid curiosity at their now-entwined fingers. “I really liked the old one, but I got it at a fancy shop in Kugane and—I mean, trips back to the Source are pretty tiring, and I can’t really afford to waste any time, and they make perfectly decent soap here.” She shrugs, trying to dispel the sudden awkward feeling clambering up her throat. “Usually I like citrus, but something about the floral scent in this was nice.”

“Roses,” Emet-Selch says quietly, and Gwen is struck with an ache in her chest so sudden and so severe that she finds herself unable to say anything at all for fear that this pain would pour out instead. She feels an impulse to kiss him but she can’t reach his lips, so she kisses the skin behind his ear, at his throat, on the nape of his neck. It feels like an apology. She doesn’t know what she’s apologizing for. 

Eventually she drifts into an uneasy sleep peppered with dreams both new and familiar: dreams of blood, of dark, of splitting pain. A hand in hers, _dear, sweet, love._

She dreams of wild roses. 


	10. Avail

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which gwen meets up with a new-old friend, and the end of the world is nigh. 
> 
> (in universes where gwen isn't the warrior of light, she's a scion who travels with the wol and their friends, and her soul is a fragment of what used to be hythlodaeus.)

Amaurot is as beautiful as it is impossible to navigate. By the third climb up one of its massive ramps, Gwen decides she hates it. 

The party splits up early into their investigation—there's nothing more dangerous than flans wandering the walkways, and if staying in a large group is just inefficient if it's not necessary for safety. And given the way Ryne keeps looking over at Khava, worrying her lip until it bleeds, they don't have any time to waste. 

Y'shtola takes off on her own, muttering something about an aetheric trail, while Falke follows behind at Gwen’s behest; Lei, Ryne, Thancred, and Urianger have made it their mission to talk to every towering Amaurotine shade they come across; Elcera and the twins are glued to Khava's side as she takes off for the Bureau of the Secretariat. Gwen is left to her own devices. 

Her first instinct is to follow Khava—but she knows the Miqo’te is in good hands, and there’s a faint prickle at the back of her neck that makes her feel like she’s being watched. She knows objectively that this is true, that Emet-Selch would have had his eyes on them the second they stepped foot onto the long stone walkways of his ghost town, but something in her gut tells her to walk. So she does. 

Before long she finds herself in a park with long stone benches and towering trees. The air is fresher here than Gwen thinks it should be, given the thousands of malms of sea above her head; she can hear the twittering of birds, though there’s none around that she can see. Couples and groups of statuesque Amaroutines stroll and picnic and talk amongst themselves.It could almost feel alive, but there’s no warmth here; for all the care that’s been put into its recreation, it’s still a shambling corpse of a city in want of a beating heart. 

Between one breath and the next she finds Emet-Selch where he wasn’t before, stretched out on the neatly manicured lawn. They don’t have any time to waste, but Gwen finds herself taking her firearm off her back and sitting in the grass next to him, sighing as she relieves her weight from her aching knees. 

“It’s beautiful,” Gwen says, looking up at the faintly glowing lights dottings the windows of these impossibly tall buildings. 

Emet-Selch turns his head to her, his gaze refocusing in the way of someone turning away from a blinding light.

“I told her to come alone,” he grouses, apparently disinclined to pay any attention to her compliment.

Gwen rolls her eyes. “And if you wanted her to come alone you should’ve said, _bring an army, Warrior of Light._ You should know by now that if you tell Khava one thing, she’ll do the opposite.” 

“So _I’m_ the fool.” 

“An astute observation.” Gwen bares her teeth in a smile. “I’d have thought the most eminent Emet-Selch would know that Khava was never coming here by herself.” 

“You are determined to die at her side, then,” he says. Gwen suspects it was meant to sound more condescending than it came out; instead he just sounds resigned. She shakes her head. 

“She died alone once,” Gwen says quietly. “I’m not letting it happen again.” 

Emet-Selch tips his head back and sighs, his eyes slipping closed. “You’re very foolish, hero.” 

“Then that makes two of us.” She reaches over and pokes gently at his cheek. His face seems more gaunt, somehow, and the circles under his eyes are darker, more worn. “And if you’re going to kill me and all of my friends in a few hours, then the least you can do is call me by my name.” 

He swats her hand away, but Gwen has trigger-quick reflexes and a rapidly shortening lifespan, so she catches his fingers, and she holds his hand. He wriggles briefly, a token protest made to defend his honor, before he acquiesces. 

“Why did you seek me out?” he asks after a moment. Gwen shrugs. 

“Why’d you let me find you?” 

He doesn’t have an answer for that. 

“We’re friends, I think,” she says thoughtfully. Emet-Selch scoffs; a theatrical, exaggerated thing.

“Yes, yes, I know,” Gwen continues quickly, “malformed creatures, less-than, unworthy, et cetera. I got all that, I don’t need the diatribe again. _But._ ” 

She shakes his hand in hers pointedly. 

“Incurably smug,” Emet-Selch mutters. Gwen beams. 

“I do my best.” 

They sit in a companionable silence for a while. Some lights in the windows up above wink off, while the street lamps wink on, and the strolling Amaurotines slowly dwindle in number. 

Then, in the distance: the echo of a cadre of boots pounding against stone accompanied by shouts of _‘Khava!’_

“That’s my cue,” Gwen says, groaning as she heaves to her feet. The ache in her knees is back with a vengeance. Twelve-damned ramps. She brushes stray bits of grass off her pants, then holds her hand out to help Emet-Selch up. He looks at her incredulously. 

But he takes her hand, and she hauls him up with her. 

_‘Elcera— ‘_

__

__

‘Can you help her?‘

_‘Khava, look at me.’_

“There’s really nothing you can do for her.” It’s a question that’s not a question, flat and matter-of-fact as she holsters her firearm. 

Emet-Selch looks off towards the commotion, his golden eyes glazing over as he looks at what Gwen can’t see.

“Would you believe me if I said I’ve tried?” he asks quietly. 

Whatever he’s seeing—Gwen just wishes she knew whatever it is he sees when he looks at their ragtag little group. When he looks at her, Schroedinger’s friend. 

When he looks at Khava, flooded with Light and still spitting mad to the last. 

“Yeah,” she says. “I would.” 

_‘Gwen? Gweeeeen!’_

She turns towards the walkway that leads back towards the main square—then she pauses, and she turns, and before he can say a thing she clasps Emet-Selch’s face between her hands and presses a fleeting kiss to his brow, right below his third eye. 

“Most eminent Emet-Selch,” she says, stepping back and sweeping into an exaggerated bow. “We shall meet again at the end of the world.” 

A grim little smile tugs at his lips. 

“I’m going to kill you and all of your friends in twelve hours,” he says. “You should call me by name, old friend.” 

She frowns and opens her mouth to say something— _unfair advantage, old man_ —but he snaps his fingers, and he’s gone. 

_‘Havoc, c’mon, we gotta go!’_

Gwen huffs out a heavy breath and shakes it off; then she mutters a quick prayer for her knees, and takes off in a sprint back towards the main square. 

When she rounds the corner she sees Elcera, Urianger, and Alphinaud arguing in low voices—Khava is off to the side, upright at least, but there’s a statuesque sheen to her skin that wasn’t there before, and a thin line of white ichor trickling from the side of her mouth. Lei, Y’shtola, and Falke are standing by her, Lei with one hand at the small of Khava’s back.

“There you are,” Lei says irritably when Gwen skids to a halt next to them. “We got permission to go into the capitol. It’s time.” 

“Right,” Gwen says, catching her breath. “Any idea what’s waiting for us?” 

“Emet-Selch has something planned.” Y’shtola’s gaze is directed towards the building in question, her brow furrowed. “I do not know what, exactly, but it’s going to be dangerous.”

“Right,” Gwen says again, heavily. She reaches out and wipes the ichor away from Khava’s mouth with a thumb, then claps the Miqo’te on the shoulder. “Good thing we’re _more_ dangerous, then.” 

Khava looks at her finally, something in her gaze clearing, and she musters up a teeth-baring grin. “Most deadliest motherfuckers across all the shards.” 

“Damn right.” Gwen slings an arm across her shoulders in a loose hug; presses a fleeting kiss to the crown of her head; takes a deep breath. “Let’s go, then. We’ve got a world to save.” 


	11. Ultracrepidarian

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in which gwen is unimpressed by the temple knights.

“Lord-Commander, you’re really going to send her out to fight dragonkin?” 

Gwen stands in Aymeric’s office with her arms folded across her chest, staring flatly at the Temple Knight who thought it was a good idea to open his mouth in her presence. Behind her, Alphinaud’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline, and he wisely opens his spellbook and engrosses himself. If he doesn’t bear witness to a crime, he can’t testify against her. 

Aymeric’s gaze flicks briefly to Gwen, then back to the knight. “Is that a problem, Ser Michel? Miss Havoc and her company have done excellent work on the Temple Knights’ behalf before.”

The knight follows his line of sight to Gwen, who he looks at properly for the first time, and whatever he sees in her makes him swallow thickly. “Er, no, Lord-Commander, not a problem, I just—” 

“State your concern, ser,” Aymeric says—not unkindly, but firmly. 

“Well, I just wonder if she’ll be, uh, well-equipped enough? For dragonkin, ser? She’s just got one of the—those Skysteel things—” 

“It’s a firearm,” Gwen says, drawing the weapon for show-and-tell, “and I can blow a hole in your armor with it, if you’d like.”

The knight pales. Aymeric shoots her a warning look, but remains silent. 

“Well?” she goes on, stepping closer to the knight. “Do you require a demonstration, Ser Michel?” 

“N-no ma’am,” he stammers out. “I shall see you in the field, then.” He offers a quick, half-assed salute towards Ser Aymeric and excuses himself with an alarming speed, clanking his way out of the office. 

Aymeric sighs, steepling his fingers. “Please stop scaring my knights, Guinevere. It’s bad for morale.”

“If your knights had a single brain between them, I wouldn’t have to scare them,” Gwen says sweetly, smiling bright at him as she stows her firearm. “Am I allowed to go win your war now?” 

He stares hard at her for a long moment, then dismisses her with a wave of his hand. 

“And please inform Miss Mallory that I would like to speak with her and Master Alphinaud,” he says, returning his attention to his paperwork. “At their earliest convenience.” 

“Of course.” Gwen offers up her own sloppy salute, and saunters out. 


End file.
